This Nouvelle Vague film has lost none of its charm and vitality of experimentation. A few hours in the life of a popular singer who is expecting the verdict of a doctor as she is suspecting cancer. The film is packed with vibrancy, and a sense of Paris. The Tarot cards predict death, and Cléopatra experiences everything with an extra charge of premonition. The film is divided into 12 chapters. Cléo meets many important people in her life, including her maid, her lover, her composer (Michel Legrand funny as himself!), her girlfriend. The silent comedy pastiche features Jean-Luc Godard and Anna Karina. Otherwise it's a brilliant showcase of Varda's fine documentary instinct. As for Jean Rabier's cinematography, I have never seen anything more beautiful than this. The story comes to an end in the park as Cléo meets a soldier of the Algerian war on the leave, and together they learn that the doctor's verdict is not that bad.

25 Years of Finnish Independence. FI 1942. PC: Valtion tiedotuslaitos. D: Topo Leistelä. M: Nils-Eric Fougstedt. Film Control: A-1725, 4.12.1942 – 400 m / 14´37". From a scratched master. Swedish subtitles. Betacam, alas. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 28 Sep 2005. The official history of independent Finland focuses on the presidents: there is (even rare/unique?) footage of Mannerheim, Ståhlberg, Svinhufvud, Kallio, Relander, Ryti. Marches celebrating the 1918 war, building the Parliament house, an industrial montage (streams, power stations, the great SOK cooperative), building the Olympic stadium. Finland, the outpost of the West in the North. The Winter war. The funeral of President Kallio. The declaration of war by Ryti. Epic views of the devastation of the war and harvesting the crops, to the impressive music by Fougstedt.

Finland Fights Part I. FI 1941. PC: Puolustusvoimat. DP: the Signal Corps cinematographers. ED: Turo Kartto 696 m / 25´26". A silent version. Betacam, alas. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 28 Sep 2005. Landscapes, the Polar Circle, winter warriors, burning barns. Animation on Finnish lost territories of the Winter War. Bitter scenes of refugees and their abandoned property. Epic views of hundreds of thousands on the march. Montage of the seasons: winter, spring, summer. The big flag is raised. The Soviet air raids, air defense, ruins of castles, impressive montages. Mannerheim mounts a train, long bicycle marches, mounted soldiers, camouflaged bazookas. Animation on the regaining of the lost territories. The march on the Karelian peninsula. Guns a'blazing, men on the march, a giant bridge in ruins, flamethrower. Animation follows the various attack wedges on the Karelian peninsula from the north to the south, culminating in the regaining of Viipuri. The film impresses visually even without sound.

The Day of Defense in Turku 6 April 1930. FI 1930. PC: Sk-yliesikunta Film Control: 16362, 20.5.1930 – 170 m / 6´13". Betacam, alas. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 28 Sep 2005. Silent, from a beautiful tinted master. Long panning shots of Turku, big military exercises with tanks on a large clearing, complete with all aspects of warfare.

A Betacam (alas) compilation viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 28 Sep 2005. The excellent compilation, cinema lobby exhibition and programme notes by Harri Hirvonen. The last two films of the compilation are especially valuable.

Wednesday, September 21, 2005

Opri. FI 1954. PC: Suomen Filmiteollisuus. P: T.J. Särkkä. D: Edvin Laine. SC: Olavi Veistäjä - based on the play by Kyllikki Mäntylä (1953). DP: Pentti Unho. AD: Karl Fager. M: Heikki Aaltoila. S: Kaarlo Nissilä. ED: Armas Vallasvuo. Starring Rakel Laakso (Opri), Elsa Turakainen (Akviliina), Elna Hellman (Miina), Liisa Pakarinen (Tiina), Ossi Kostia (Otto Arolin), Eero Roine (Alpertti), Sylvi Salonen (the Head of the Seniors' Home), Marjatta Kallio (Heinäsirkka, the nurse), Kosti Klemelä (Jussi the farmhand). 78 min. A vintage print with signs of wear but a good definition. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 21 Sep 2005. The magnificent interpretation of Rakel Laakso carries the picture and makes it worthwhile. Such a portrait probably will be called immortal in the future. It takes place at a senior people's home where Opri becomes the light of the inhabitants' lives. She is a seer, a dreamer who compares herself to Joseph, maybe a (white) witch. Rakel Laakso knows what she's doing but the film has been put together in a hurry. Laine keeps missing points and sinks too often into the lowbrow. The epic aspect is promising with montages of lost Karelia, the challenge of after-war reconstruction, and daily work. Besides Opri another bright character is Marjatta Kallio's nurse; also Sylvi Salonen is fine as the mistress of the house. But there is too much that is contrived and repetitive here despite the short duration.

THE FILM CONCERT. Jussi Myllys (tenor), Veli Kujala (accordeon), Paula Nykänen (violin), Markus Hohti (cello), Tuula Hällström (piano). Arranged by Tuula Hällström (2005) based on the original score by Emil Kauppi (1928) based on the original music by Oskar Merikanto (1899).

A beautiful film concert expertly and movingly interpreted by the five young musicians in the true Oskar Merikanto spirit. - The music was far superior to the film. I heard that in the second screening the audience even liked the film because the music was strong enough to carry even it!

Friday, September 09, 2005

US April 1945. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 15'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 9 Sept 2005. Vertovian. Whereas the Why We Fight films are propaganda, this piece is agitation in the pure Vertovian sense of montage as rhythm. German history of militarism, under Bismarck, Wilhelm II, Hitler. Tomorrow the world. We almost lost. Montages on suffering. A great sense of rhythm. Can it happen again? Don't relax. Two million ex-Nazi officials out of uniform. The German youth is the most dangerous, poisoned, soaked, the worst education in crime, trained to hate and to destroy. Don't argue. Don't make friends. Don't shake the hand that hailed Hitler, that bombed and destroyed, that held the whip over slaves. The phony peace / war has come to an end.

US 1943. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 72'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 9 Sept 2005. Montages on wars, on America. Walter Huston's voice summarizing the history of America, the ideals of freedom and equality. The memorable years written in lightning. In this brotherhood, America was born. The poem of Lazarus. As strangers to one another we came. Multi-ethnicity. A montage on the great years of building the US. Five times blood freely shed. Children, schools. The American way of life, of fast food and free press and highways. 1917: make the world safe for democracy. The Nazis: tomorrow the world. Gallup polls summarize the great change in US opinion. Dean Acheson. The course of WWII from the 1931 Manchurian campaign. A brilliant animation on the German-Japanese strategy against the US. The strategic importance of South America. Brazil, Equador, Argentina. Havana Conference. The horrific scenario of the progress of Japan and Germany, on the threshold of reigning over seventy percent of the world. Why we aid Russia and China. December 7th. Roosevelt's declaration of war. A great ending to a great series.

Thursday, September 08, 2005

US 1944. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals. SC: Carlton Moss, D: Stuart Heisler]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 41'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 8 Sept 2005. "Joshua fit the battle of Jericho". Black audience at church hears the wise sermon of preacher Carlton Moss. The black American history summarized. Hitler's thoughts on the black people are quoted. A mother reads a letter from her son, which is illustrated as a montage sequence of a soldier's path in US Army. West Point, Tuskegee. A montage on the tasks of war. Paying homage to the war heroes.

US 1944. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 63'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 8 Sept 2005. This film was for me the biggest revelation of all in terms of historical information. It covers the Japanese aggression on China since 1931. It summarizes 4000 years of Chinese culture; how the divided country became a nation under the Japanese attack. Sun Yat-Sen the Chinese Lincoln. The Tanaka Plan: Manchuria, Shanghai, Jehol. Stunning animation on the Japanese strategy. Chiang Kai-Shek. The greatest mass migration ever recorded. Unforgettable epic images on the millions on the move. The air war. The Chinese armament. The Burma Road: breathtaking epic sequence. General Chennault's Flying Tigers. The course of the Yellow River changed (!). The Chinese guerrilla war. The great distances, the rivers, the marshes. The Tanaka Plan slowed down in China. Phase 3: the Pacific - phase 4: the US. Changsha, again a stunning animation. Madame Chiang Kai-Shek addressing the Congress. This Why We Fight film, the most criticized one, was for me the most precious one.

US 1943. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 81'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 8 Sept 2005. For James Agee, the mightiest American war movie ever besides The Birth of a Nation. It is the film about the greatest war operation in history: Operation Barbarossa. USSR, a sixth of the earth, is presented in its multi-ethnicity and variety of resources. Hitler's way to the Eastern war is summarized: Hungary, Rumania, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria. Albania, Greece. The giant attack of 22 June 1941 focusing on the directions of Leningrad, Moscow, and Kiev. The animations of strategy are excellent, illuminating the German wedge and trap and the Russian defense in depth strategies. The cities as strongholds. Sevastopol. Beautiful montages of faces. The Russian strategy of scorched earth; destroyed giant dams. Guerilla war. The Volokolamsk highway. The museums of Tchaikovsky, Tolstoy vandalized. Great emotional force in footage on Russians burying their loved ones. Retreat in spring 1942: the legend of Nazi invincibility defeated. The siege of Leningrad, a powerful sequence; the road to life across Lake Ladoga. The strategic meaning of Stalingrad for the whole war. Everything else in WWII was a prelude to Stalingrad. Finally the Germans get to taste their own wedge and trap strategy. The greatest battle in history, the turning-point of WWII. Finns under Mannerheim are not mentioned together with Hungary, Rumania, and Bulgaria as Hitlerite allies; Finns are mentioned as co-belligerents in Operation Barbarossa, with a strategic importance in the siege of Leningrad. This films omits any critical remark on Stalin's Russia. In WHY WE FIGHT, Finland is first mentioned here, and fleetingly in the same context in the last film. In its bias, still extremely impressive.

Saturday, September 03, 2005

Voitto Tunisiassa / Seger i Tunisien. US/GB 1944. U.S. Army Bureau of Public Relations / British Ministry of Information. No personal on-screen credits. [P+D: Frank Capra, Hugh Stewart. Additional reconstructed footage: John Huston. SC: J.L. Hodson, Anthony Veiller, Roy Boulting, Alfred Black. M: Dimitri Tiomkin. Commentary read by Leo Genn, Anthony Veiller. Voice of US soldier Adams: Burgess Meredith, voice of UK soldier Metcalf: Bernard Miles]. AFI: 85'. Finnish release: 76'. The vintage Finnish nitrate print released by Väinän Filmi 60 years ago viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 3 Sep 2005. In Huston and Capra biographies this film is harshly dealt with as a fabrication. Now it does not look any different from the Why We Fight series. Probably the harshness of the criticism is based on the fact that so many involved in the actual battle were able to compare the film with the reality. It is a work of montage, as are the Why We Fight films, and it's based on an idea, a concept, and the film is an illustration of the concept. The most impressive points are conveyed via animation. One has to congratulate the way the film manages to convey a strong idea of strategy and simultaneously a feeling of the mess of reality. The strategic weight of the African campaign is very clearly expressed. It was the turning-point in the Western Allies' war against Hitler. The triple strike in Casablanca, Algiers and Oran. The heavy weather: the rain season, the winter, the casualties. The strategic air command. The new strategy of the air force. The historical links to Scipio, Hannibal. Soldiers at war and play. The suffering of the civilians, the children. The returning civilians. The importance of the mules. A memorable shot of Jewish kids: it's now OK to take the yellow star off. Rommel's genius and backlash for the Allied. The ingenious Cylinder Strategy of the Allied. Alexander and Cunningham. The magnificent final campaign: Hill 609, Goubellet Plain, Longstop Hill, Djebel Mansour, Takrouna. A staccato blitz montage of images, in themselves incomprehensible, only made meaningful via the animated maps. "The spark plug was ours", and now they are given all we've got. The Nazis get what they'd been giving us. Split into four, the Nazis surrender, 266.000 of them, fully equipped. Montages of the wreckage. A montage of the union of nations and people of all countries, laughing children. Africa is free, Europe that much nearer to - the giant V.

Thursday, September 01, 2005

US 1943. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 42'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 30 Aug 2005. Impressive footage of Hitler examining the Eiffel Tower starts the film. "Where Napoleon failed I shall succeed". The German military strategy to take Britain is startlingly summarized, with brilliant animation. The German material supremacy is overwhelming, but Britain starts to arm. Churchill: "we shall never surrender". Luftwaffe vs. the RAF is the main action of this film. The ports take terrible pounding. Learning from their allies' mistakes, the Brits keep their planes scattered and hidden. New tacticts: the German bomb factories, change formations. The hell over coastal defenders. Next step: terrorizing London, to demoralize Britain. The Blitz over London, the Luftwaffe's greatest effort. Devastation in London, Buckingham Palace, Fleet Street, St. Paul's Cathedral. Next step: night attacks, to terrorize the people to cry for mercy. People rise in the morning to witness the wreckage. "The British spirit stronger than ever". The RAF starts to counter-attack, targeting Bremen. Hitler cries 1000-fold revenge. Coventry smashed. Montages on work, on life under the Blitz, Christmas in the subway. Next step: millions of fire bombs to burn London. Vital water mains shattered when Thames was at its lowest ebb. This was the people's war, and the people wouldn't panic. The Battle of Britain was won, and not by Hitler. Gone was the legend of their invincibility. Churchill: never in history has so much been accomplished for so many by so few. Very effective propaganda.

US 1943. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 57'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 31 Aug 2005. In direct continuation to Why We Fight 2, this focuses on the reaction of Poland's Western allies: England's declaration of war (with Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa etc.), and the Nazis' strategy of divide and conquer. To reach better England, they target Norway, occupying Denmark on the way. The tactics of "Trojan horse" merchant ships is depicted. Images of winter war in Norway. France is the main subject of this film. There was Marshal Foch of WWI: "J'attaque!". There is André Maginot of WWII: I defend. The Maginot Line is magnificent, and the German strategy is not to go near it. The Kellogg-Briand pact. The disillusioned nation, six million lost in WWI, the flower of a generation, the spirit of the phony war. Hitler's strategy is portrayed as an illuminative animation. How they take Holland, bomb Rotterdam, how Belgium is taken, the genius of the German engineers in bombing and building bridges for tanks. Little villages destroyed to create crowds of refugees to stop the light armies. While the Allies flank the main thrust is in the Ardennes, the mightiest army ever. Tremendous concentration of firepower. Brilliant animation helps understand the genius of the German attack. Dunkirk: one of the greatest disasters of military history. Memorable epic footage. Hitler and the statue of Foch, French leaders forced to sign treaty with Hitler in Foch's coach. Two million French hostages taken to concentration camps. Hitler on the Champs-Elysées. La Marseillaise: soul born again. Rhetorically excellent war propaganda.

Aaltoska i sitt ässe / [Mrs. Aaltonen Organizes]. FI 1949. PC: Suomen Filmiteollisuus. P: T.J. Särkkä. D: Edvin Laine. Assistant D: Matti Kassila. SC: Topias. DP: Osmo Harkimo. AD: Aarre Koivisto. M: Heikki Aaltoila. S: Taisto Lindegren. ED: Armas Vallasvuo. Starring: Elna Hellman (Aaltoska), Veli-Matti Kaitala (Jukka Lehtinen), Hannes Häyrinen (crime reporter Lipponen), Kalle Viherpuu (the janitor Aaltonen), Ritva-Leena (Kaarina Hillevi Mäenpää), Pikku-Annika (Irmeli Lehtinen). 70'. A brilliant safety print viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 31 Aug 2005. The producer Särkkä brought his both child stars, Veli-Matti and Little Annika, together in a run-of-the-mill film with surefire ingredients. There is even a theme song, which is sung by Mrs. Aaltonen before the credits and continued by Mr. Aaltonen in the end. The tyrannical janitor's wife reigns in the courtyard, the janitor hardly daring to emerge from the boiler room. It is the era of heavy regulation of rented apartments, and there is an obligation to make spare rooms available for tenants. It is also the era of lots of children and divided households. Veli-Matti is already a clerk at a gas station, and Little Annika gets to deal with the bureaucracy of the apartment regulation. They get lucky with two child tenants who come to school to Helsinki from Nurmijärvi. There is a zealous crime reporter (Hannes Häyrinen) on the trail of shady underground activity. In the end it is revealed that the underground gang is that of "black tenants" with no crime involved. The SF experts, the cinematographer Osmo Harkimo, the art director Aarre Koivisto, conjure expert imagery, and there are some exciting documentary views of contemporary life. But it's a trivial film.

About Me

Antti Alanen (born 1955) is Film Programmer at National Audiovisual Institute (Finland), which runs the Cinema Orion in Helsinki. This diary is an irregular notebook and scrapbook of rough notes on films and related matters. Spoiler alert: I spoil everything because for me plot and conclusion are essential to discuss!

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Freddie Redd Quartet: The Music from The Connection [1960] (Freddie Redd Six Classic Albums 2/6)

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Introducing Freddie Redd (Freddie Redd Six Classic Albums 1/6)

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Kenny Dorham: Jazz Contrasts

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Joe Henderson: Page One

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